Moving On
by blackbeltchic
Summary: Based off of the end of Phillip Pullman's Sally Lockhart trilogy. Sally does some thinking, visits a cemetary, and then goes to find Dan.


Title: Moving on  
  
Author: blackbeltchic  
  
Summery: Ok, I just want to point out, that Phillip Pullman is an awesome author. I am not trying to change his book. I just think that he left out a chapter, is all. This is what we should have learned, after Sally and Harriet set of for Daniel Goldberg's.  
  
Disclaimer: Phillip Pullman is an awesome author, and everything belongs to him. Even the idea. He hints at this in the last chapter, I'm just. . . . . embellishing. I do not own anything. Please don't hurt me!  
  
The first part takes place before the book ends!!  
  
~ * ~  
  
Sally walked through the quiet. She hadn't been here in awhile, not since Harriet was born. She felt bad that she had never brought her child here. She knelt down by the grave.  
  
"Fred. It's me. You probably know about the trouble I've been in. And if you were here, then you'd be calling me names, or whatnot. But your are not, and Harriet needs a father, Fred. This was all possible, because you were not here." She sighed. "Fred, I loved you with all my heart, but I need to move on sometime. I am trying to move on. Don't hate me for it. I can't keep waiting for you to come back, because you aren't going to. Dan will love Harriet like she was his, and he'll take good care of me.  
  
"I love you, Fred." She was somewhat surprised she hadn't shed a tear. Keep your powder dry. Her father's saying came back to her. That's what she was doing.  
  
She stayed by the grave of Fredrick Garland for a few more minutes, before going to relieve Sarah-Jane.  
  
~ * ~  
  
There was a knock on the door.  
  
"Come in."  
  
She and the child, Harriet came in.  
  
"Sally!" he said, getting up from his desk, where he was writing, pages all over the desk and floor. "This is unexpected."  
  
"I know. Mr. Goldberg, Daniel, Dan, I wanted to thank you for looking after us. Harriet especially." Now was it. If she didn't say it now, she never would.  
  
"Sally, tell me about Harriet's father." She was surprised. "Tell me as much as you can. Don't leave anything out for my sake."  
  
She nodded. "I met Fredrick Garland when I was 16. He was 21. He was a photographer, and the business he had with his uncle, Webster, was failing. He saved me from a sticky predicament, and later I went to him when I left my aunt's house. He gave me a job, and a room. With his help, I figured out the mystery behind my Father's death, both of them, really. And things were good.  
  
"I decided to move out, find my own place, and start my own business. Fredrick kept asking me to marry him, and it. . . . I wanted to, but I was afraid of loosing my independence. So I told him no. and we fought and we yelled, and screamed at each other. Being a part of his Uncle's business meant I had to go there every so often.  
  
"Almost three years now, I guess, I found myself in hot water once again. A client of mine had lost her life savings, and I was admandant to get it back. I got on somebody's wrong side, and they tried to kill me. They killed Chaka, my dog, and Jim and Fred wouldn't hear any arguments about me living with them again.  
  
"So I moved back in with them, and I guess it was the danger of almost dying, the attack was supposed to take me out, and it wasn't a random hit. The guy attacked the friend I had staying with me, and she almost died. But then we both moved into the house with Jim and Fred and Webster.  
  
"I realized that I could marry him, and still keep my independence. So. . . ." This was the hard part. "We made love. I didn't want him thinking that I was doing it because we were going to get married. And then he asked me, I accepted. And then the fire. He tried to save Isabelle, but she would have none of it, and he died in the fire. That was the night Harriet was conceived." Through most of her narrative, she had looked him in the eyes, but she had to drop her gaze. She couldn't look at him and see the disgust in his face that she knew was there.  
  
"I killed the man responsible for his death, after tricking him, as well as getting the money for my client. I had wanted to die in that explosion, but I was saved. I was thrown free, and McKinnon, a client of Fred's, he was also a detective, and Jim found me.  
  
"And for awhile, Harriet was the only thing keeping me going, and I found out, was it only a couple days ago, how ashamed I am of myself. I let Sarah- Jane do everything, I don't even know how to care for my child. And she needs a father. And not a dead one either." Then she switched gears.  
  
"You remind me of him so much. Not in your looks, but in your spirit. Fred might not have told a story, but more likely stopped that mob, to get a picture of them, because that's the type of person he was. If trouble didn't find him first, he went and found it. A lot like me, I guess." She took a deep breath, to tell him, but she couldn't. She had lost her nerve, and she was ashamed of herself for it. She was one of the first women to own a business, and she couldn't even follow her heart?  
  
"Sally . . . . Veronica Beatrice Lockhart. . . .I will understand if you refuse me, but I would like it very much if you became my wife. Would you marry me?" He asked. This was the fourth time she had gotten a proposal that she would take seriously. She had never taken Fred seriously, except for that last time, and then Axel Bellmann, but she killed him in revenge for Fred, and then Charlie Bertram. But she had refused him. And here was Daniel Goldberg asking.  
  
"I would love to be your wife." He looked at her, wondering if she was serious. "I realized I loved you in Lee's house, on Fournier road. I guess it takes immense danger for me to find where my heart lies." She smiled.  
  
She knew that he would take good care of her and Harriet, and Harriet would finally have a father. 


End file.
